Wrexham 1st leg

[Chris De Burger]

Link to Wrexham player YouTube chanel I'm afraid it not got your goal up yet but no doubt be on official highlights tomorrow afternoon.

[Chris De Burger]

http://m.youtube.com/channel/UCS7BAYpqOSaYy-pZp6oO4PA
oops

[tomogull]

Yep it was Courtney Richards. Interesting that Stretford Gull described him as atrocious were as I've got him as your MOM. Guess it's all about opinions.

Actually, you're both right. He works hard and he wins the ball but the reason he's in the Conference and not Div 1 or 2 is that his ball control and distribution is dreadful.

[gullintwoplaces]

Gullinwotplaces - how can you actually congratulate the team and the manager? - we were by all accounts f**king rubbish and got out of jail bigtime. We struggled to beat FC United playing Bowman up front by himself so what does Hargreaves do? - makes the same bloody mistake again.
Goal a game Rice gifts them another one and we only manage to rescue ourselves when we play two up front in the last 15 minutes.
The French bloke can apparently play at right back - if thats the case I cannot understand for the life of me why Hargreaves doesn't play him or indeed Macdonald there aned play Pearce in his right position.

Because they came away with a one goal deficit in the first leg of a two legged semi final. That, in my book, is acceptable. You weren't there, and I get pissed off by your "by all accounts" comments, because that is what you always say. I trust the people who were there, and the Wrexham fan's helpful comments. Sure we are struggling, but we are still in the competition. The people who DID go, and as I say I trust their judgement rather than yours, tell us that we didn't play well on a dreadful pitch. That's fine, we didn't play well, and we are still in it. That is why I say congratulations to the manager and the team. Still, you know best, or you think you do.

[Tamargull]

I am delighted we are still in it but I really don't know how? Only have the commentary and match reports to go by but it does seem that CH tactics are very questionable. One up front was never going to work and would only succeed in inviting constant pressure from the opposition (which it did).
I starting to think we have a decent squad but that CH does not know his best team and is tactically often gets it wrong. I think we can go through next week but only if CH does not mess up!! Should he be congratulated for yesterday? No chance!!!

[Tamargull]

I am delighted we are still in it but I really don't know how? Only have the commentary and match reports to go by but it does seem that CH tactics are very questionable. One up front was never going to work and would only succeed in inviting constant pressure from the opposition (which it did).
I starting to think we have a decent squad but that CH does not know his best team and is tactically often gets it wrong. I think we can go through next week but only if CH does not mess up!! Should he be congratulated for yesterday? No chance!!!

[Dave]

As said early in the thread went to watch my lad play yesterday. A friend of mine was keeping me updated, he sent me a text that said, Dave Thomas described the game as 'Wrexham v the dog and duck' it appears that CH went away from 4-4-2 yesterday, that I just can't understand, it's been proved time and time again that 4-4-2 is our squads 'A' game, play to your own strengths not to the strengths of the other team.

That said G-I-T-P is right, at 2.1 it's only half time and we're very much still in it, yesterdays result however will only be a good result with a 2 goal win next week. Just hoping for a fantastic performance next week, we'll never have better chance to win a national cup that we have now.

[brucie]

Just seen Wrexhams second goal - ok their bloke is clean through but has completely scuffed his shot and Rice has somehow managed to pat it straight to their forward - its a yet another really bad mistake. Should have done far better

[hector]

Just seen Wrexhams second goal - ok their bloke is clean through but has completely scuffed his shot and Rice has somehow managed to pat it straight to their forward - its a yet another really bad mistake. Should have done far better

I would agree that Rice's attempt to save was pretty feeble. I'm sure he could have done better. Good keepers would have held onto the ball there but while we have people like David Thomas of the Herald Express peddling this nonsense that Rice is a good shot-stopper, we will end up with him getting offered a new contract and put up with his errors next season.

However, when you do look at the video, watch Angus MacDonald. It's his player that scores the rebound. Had MacDonald been marking him, he would not have been free to tap in the rebound, so I don't think the goal is wholly down to Rice.

[SuperNickyWroe]

Just seen Wrexhams second goal - ok their bloke is clean through but has completely scuffed his shot and Rice has somehow managed to pat it straight to their forward - its a yet another really bad mistake. Should have done far better

Brucie, you mention the shot was scuffed, if Ricey had "set" for a shot with the laces put through the ball, this may have caught him out - been there done that myself...
So he wasn't expecting the scuffed shot...
And as has been mentioned the reason the player had a tap in, was that our defenders were daydreaming....(again...)

[FishGull]

I am returning to the forum after about a year off so bear with me please ladies and gentlemen.

I havent had time to look through the previous posts in any great detail but I do wish to share my opinions of yesterday's game and see what you think.

The overall feeling after the game for me was "It was awful, but it could've been a whole lot worse"

The overall performance was quite frankly dreadful. Before they scored I felt the game was relatively even with both teams having the odd chance and half chance but as soon as their screamer flew in, we looked completely useless. The midfield was over-run, there was a lack of physicality and commitment, Courtney Cameron barely moved from the touchline and when he did it was simply to jog aimlessly towards a ball which he put half a foot towards with absolutely no intention of making a solid challenge whatsoever.

The start of the second half was similar to the first, no commitment, no possession, no passion. I think Ricey may have been partially at fault for their second goal but it was nothing undeserved. I liked the look of Campbell when he came on (partially because he wasnt Courtney Cameron!!). He seemed lively and had an eye for goal with a couple of attempts and his turn/run/cross for Bowman was superb, even if the goal did come off his crutch.

Overall, they were far too good for us in all departments, and deserved to score many more. Rice did keep us in it with his shot stopping, but from set-pieces he looked shaky as anything and his kicking was very poor so he almost had to be brilliant from shots to cover up his poor overall game.

A disappointing performance for me, but the result leaves us still in the tie and I think we may be able to get something out of it next week, I bloody hope so!! :S

[nickbrod]

Rejoining the Forum you decided it's so good you posted twice!
Seriously if Rice's kicking was poor so too was the Wrexham keeper's who for me was no better. It's a great pity we didn't test him more as he's a weak link.
Bowman and Campbell up front together next week would cause Wrexham's defence all kinds of trouble.